Hammond misled MPs over Saudi abuse

Volunteers search for survivors under the rubble of buildings destroyed by an airstrike carried out by the Saudi-led coalition in the Yemeni capital, Sana’aYAHYA ARHAB/EPA

Philip Hammond misled MPs when he was foreign secretary with incorrect assurances that Saudi Arabia was not abusing human rights in Yemen, the government admitted last night.

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office issued a statement retracting four written answers given to MPs and deleting from the official record two speeches by ministers in the Commons.

Philip Hammond told MPs in January there was no evidence the Saudi-led coalition was targeting Yemeni civiliansJack Taylor/Getty Images

All the erroneous statements said that Britain had satisfied itself that Saudi Arabia had not been in breach of international human rights law in the conflict. If the country had been in breach, Britain would have had to discontinue its arms sales.

The Foreign Office conceded yesterday that no such assessment of human rights had ever been carried out and it did not know whether illegal violations had taken place.